Interpersonal Communication- A Mindful Approach to Relationships, 2020a

marked by gradual changes that help you lead to your ultimate result. Career strategizing isn’t something
that happens once. Often our intended career paths take twists and turns we never expected or predicted.
However, our collegial peers are often great resources for helping us think through this process either
within a specific organization or a larger field.
Job-Related Feedback
Second, collegial peers also provide us with job-related feedback. We often turn to those who are around
us the most often to see how we are doing within an organization. Our collegial peers can provide us this
necessary feedback to ensure we are doing our jobs to the utmost of our abilities and the expectations of
the organization. Under this category, the focus is purely on how we are doing our jobs and how we can
do our jobs better.
Recognizing Competence and Performance
Third, collegial peers are usually the first to recognize our competence in the workplace and
recognize us for excellent performance. Generally speaking, our peers have more interactions with us on
the day-to-day job than middle or upper management, so they are often in the best position to recognize
our competence in the workplace. Our competence in the workplace can involve having valued attitudes
(e.g., liking hard work, having a positive attitude, working in a team), cognitive abilities (e.g., information
about a field, technical knowledge, industry-specific knowledge), and skills (e.g., writing, speaking,
technical ability) necessary to complete critical work-related tasks. Not only do our peers recognize our
attitudes, cognitive abilities, and skills, but they are also there to pat us on the backs and tell us we’ve
done a great job when a task is complete.
Friendship
Lastly, collegial peers provide us a type of friendship in the workplace. They also offer us someone we
can both like and trust in the workplace. Now, it’s important to distinguish this level of friendships from
other types of friendships we have in our lives. Collegial peers are not going to be your “best friends,” but
they will offer you friendships within the workplace that make work more bearable and even enjoyable.
At the collegial level, you may not associate with these friends beyond workplace functions (e.g., sitting
next to each other at meetings, having lunch together, finding projects to work on together). It’s also possible
that a group of collegial peers will go to events outside the workplace as a group (e.g., going to happy
hour, throwing a holiday party, attending a baseball game).
The final group of peers we work with are called special peers. Kram and Isabella note that a special peer
relationship “involves revealing central ambivalences and personal dilemmas in work and family realms.
Pretense and formal roles are replaced by greater self-disclosure and self-expression.” 38
relationships are marked by confirmation, emotional support, personal feedback, and friendship.
Confirmation
First, special peers provide us with validation. When we are having one of our darkest days at work and
are not sure we’re doing our jobs well, our special peers are there to let us know that we’re doing a good
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Interpersonal Communication